Various dartboard games utilize a throwing dart of the type having a shaped front end that pierces and is retained by the game board and a tail portion having a plurality of flights (also known as vanes, fins, or feathers) that stabilize and provide consistent flight characteristics of the dart after it has left the thrower's hand en route to the game board. The shaped front end may be either blunt or sharpened to correspond with the particular type of game board in use. The front end and tail portion are affixed to opposite ends of a weighted dart body or barrel.
The flights of the tail portions of many throwing darts are typically extended in a radially outward orientation relative to the longitudinal axis of the dart, the degree of extension being functionally related to the desired flight characteristics of the dart. However, the extended flights present a cross-sectional area somewhat greater than the cross-sectional area of the dart body. The extended flights of a dart already imbedded in or in place on the game board may interfere with the target area adjacent that dart, such that subsequently thrown darts strike and are deflected by the flights of the in-place dart, thereby preventing subsequently thrown darts from piercing and/or being retained on the game board. This problem is magnified when a plurality of previously thrown darts are clustered in high-point-value zones of the game board. Subsequently thrown darts may be deflected in the aforementioned manner or may dislodge one or more of the previously thrown darts in place on the game board.
One approach to solving this interference problem is to provide a dart with a body that breaks away from a magnetically-held point when the point impacts and pierces the game board, as described in U.S. Pat. No. 4,109,915. Another approach is to provide a dart having flexible flights that move from an operable fanned position during throwing to a stored collapsed position when the point impacts the game board as described in British Patent No. 594,574 and U.K. Patent Application No. 2227426.
Another problem is the lodging of the points or front end portions of subsequently thrown darts in the rearwardly opening recesses of the tail portions of previously thrown darts. The resulting impact, jamming, and subsequent separation often causes damage to both darts.